irinya's notes: Kiri Teambuilding in December Challenges 8-10

Since Kiri is probably my new favorite card in all of PAD, I thought I'd showcase some ways to use her. Today she'll take on Challenges 8, 9, and 10. These are challenging dungeons for most players (especially Challenge 10) but can all be done quite straightforwardly by ignoring most of the hits. These builds are designed to use a reasonable mix of farmables and REM, and typically do not require huge REM investment. I won't cover C7 and below in this post since if you are at a place to think about the final three of the set, C7 and below are probably not difficult.

Keep in mind that I don't necessarily think this is the best way to approach these challenges, and certainly not a preferable one if you wish to farm them. I present these builds to demonstrate what Kiri can do and give examples of cheese-style teambuilding. That said, I wholeheartedly encourage you to use her if you so desire!

Jump to: [ General | Challenge 8 | Challenge 9 | Challenge 10 ]

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Here's a quick recap of Kiri:

HP: 4189 | ATK: 1920 | RCV: 290 | WT: 899 | Dragon/Attacker LS: 3x ATK when clearing 6 connected Water Orbs, 5x when 8+ connected; Reduce damage from Fire Att. enemies by 75%. [1/25/1, 93.75% reduction] AS: Changes all enemies' Att. to Fire (ignores status shield); other allies' skills charge by 1 turn. [CD: 16]

And some general information about leading with her:

• Kiri's general playstyle focuses on her leader skill's 93.75% damage reduction. Factoring in the resist awakenings on both leaders gives a total of 94.375% fire damage reduction. This usually lets her convert a spawn, then easily stall for actives.
• Her very mediocre damage multiplier is offset by the fact that most of the time it is nearly impossible to die, allowing you to stall and wear down nearly anything. This doesn't take nearly as long as it sounds, especially against Dragons.
• Unlike Minerva cheese with Skydragons, Kiri's tankiness is not dependent on awakenings; awakening binds (such as Persephone's in C10) are typically not game-ending.
• The overall approach for each spawn in these challenges is as described above: convert to red, stall for Kiri and other orb changers, wear down, and kill. Most of the time, you can freely use inherited orb changers to secure a kill shot. Any notable exceptions to this approach will be pointed out.
• A generous amount of Skill Boost is usually needed, but Kiri does not always have to be up immediately on Turn 1, which can simplify things. The SB requirement can further be reduced by inheriting a haste onto something like Tengu.
• Most of the spawns in these three challenges can be stalled out and one-shot with 100% True Gravity. I elected not to go this route largely because Zeus-Vers, the best option for this, is not yet available in NA. Thus, my teambuilding at the moment focuses more on simply doing damage with blue rows. It's surprising how far 25x can take you when you can't really die.
• The sample builds use autohealing, since it is quite effective in these dungeons. Non-autohealing ones are slightly less brainless but still very possible, and I do discuss some non-autohealing possibilities.
• When I ran these dungeons I used Misery as an autohealer in all of them. Odin Dragon is a technically farmable and far superior option, though I didn't have the correct form when I actually ran the builds. I have since purchased a second Odin Dragon and rectified this problem.
• Other common-ish cards with four or more autoheals include Zeus Ace (farmable), Himi Udon (farmable with two Poison resists!), Green Odin, Uriel, Gabriel, Michael, and Archangel Lucifer. If you happen to have NY Jeanne d'Arc and are interested enough in running Kiri to invest in her (she is terrible mostly everywhere else), she is nearly as good as Odin Dragon.
• If you don't want to invest in autoheals, Ronove has two Skill Boosts and is an excellent fast Heart maker, allowing you to easily bank Heart orbs. He also gets a bonus mention in some contexts for being a very fast hazard clear (especially helpful in C8).

Because not everyone has access to everything, I've designed these teams to be gentle on REM and use common GFEs when possible. (The main exception is Misery, since she is the best combination of accessible and effective, but even she has replacements, as described above.) As such, none of the builds are set in stone. Feel free to use Tengus over Whaledors if you'll still have enough SB, etc. Even the inherits are only suggestions -- Karin is just as good as Urd if you combo her with Sitri unless you desperately need the hearts, Urd can combo with Siegfried instead of Sitri, and so forth. The yellow box inherit means that you can inherit any helpful orb change or board that you want to that slot. Don't inherit non-Kiri cards on your Kiris.

All team images were created with PDC. Only cards displaying as +297 need to be fully hypermaxed; you can get away with skimping on plusses as long as everything has levels, awakenings, and enough skillups so that you don't die on Floor 1 of each dungeon. (Investing in your cards does, of course, help make clears easier and faster.)

If you have any questions on whether a substitution will still allow you to clear, please ask!

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Challenge 8 -- All Atts. Required

Overview. This is honestly probably the most intimidating of the set, as the progression of Dark Izanami > Dark Metatron TAMADRA > Beelzebub leaves fairly little breathing room. Make sure not to screw yourself over during this spawn sequence. While technically possible to enter the dungeon with around 11 Skill Boosts and allow the Keeper of Forest to smack you around for a bit, I opted for the safer approach.

Team Setup. All Attributes makes teambuilding slightly more challenging than usual because there aren't many truly useful red coverage options. Fortunately, Blazing Ice Ogre is farmable in Monday Dungeon, covers the needed colors, and provides two Skill Boosts. A board change or hazard clear is needed to deal with Beelzebub. Otherwise, the priorities are Skill Boosts, damage-enhancing awakenings, and orb generation inherits. You get two turns to stall on Floor 1, so 14 Skill Boosts are required.



Urd and Sitri are used together to make boards that are 2/3 water and 1/3 heart, maximizing your damage potential. Flex inherits can be any blue orb makers or boards. This sample team has 15 SB; you may make sensible sub replacements you like (perhaps you have better red coverage than Blazing Ice Ogre) as long as you end up with 14 SB and all attributes still covered.

• Floor 1. Not a very tough spawn. Convert, stall, save orbs, and kill.
• Floor 2. You actually don't need to convert Lilith. If you soak three hits without damaging her, she will generate 10 turns of Mortal Poison skyfall (which is way less dangerous than it sounds) and kill herself. She hits for less than 10k each turn, so this is the quickest way past her.
• Floor 3. Convert. Izanami's Poisons are only a big deal if you let them build up. Autoheal builds can safely clear four Poisons a turn with no consequence. The God bind under 50% is irrelevant since it won't target Kiri. You can use an active to get her low, but because the next two floors are quite dangerous, try to have both of your Kiris, a board change/hazard clear active, AND another orb maker up when you kill Izanami.
• Floor 4. Convert and match a row of 6-8 water right away. Use a orb maker if you have to; make sure you save the board change/hazard clear though. You will die if the Mythlits get too many binds off. It is actually impossible to stall long-term here since nearly any match you do will take off some of Metatron TAMADRA's 22 HP. If you need to stall a bit, avoid matching attributes that will do more than 1-2 damage.
• Floor 5. Convert and use your board change/hazard clear to wipe his Poisons. If you don't have a second board change/hazard clear ready, I'd suggest you don't actually try to damage Beelzebub too much initially, since dropping him below 50% results in another full Poison board (and probably your swift death). Once you do have actives back, feel free to hit below 50%, change away his board, and kill. Only Kiri is needed for the last floor.
• Floor 6. Convert and you basically just win. No fancy mechanics here -- a nice relief after the previous three floors.

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Challenge 9 -- No RCV

Overview. The easiest of the three by far, and extremely unremarkable. Very few specific teambuilding considerations. Kiri plus autohealing completely nullifies every single mechanic in this dungeon that could conceivably be difficult.

Team Setup. Autohealing makes the dungeon a cakewalk, as this dungeon doesn't require SBR or hazard clear or really much of anything. (If you aren't using autoheals, make sure you bring at least one fast Heart maker. Strawberry Dragon earns a mention here for having two Skill Boosts and further reducing the damage you take from Hephaestus.) You can only really tank one hit from Floor 1, so 15 SB is best.



Truthfully, C9 is so straightforward with Kiri that you could do this without any inherits at all. For safety, however, you'd probably want to inherit some Heart making. Sherias is here for being an easy to roll, on-color, 2 SB card with meaningful killers; he can of course be replaced with something else useful. This sample team has 15 SB; you can make any appropriate replacements as long as you still have enough. If 15 SB is too impractical for you, consider having a quick haste inherit (ex. Sumire) to charge your Kiris without needing as much.

• Floor 1. Convert, stall, and kill. You can't die to this after converting. Leave this floor with both Kiris up.
• Floor 2. I've done 100% fire resist cheese in dungeons with Drawn Joker before, and it's made me want to stab my eyes out because its moveset takes approximate four years of real time every turn. Fortunately, it makes a ton of waters. In terms of both practicality (it's annoying to unmatch all the waters) and IRL time spent, it's simply not worth stalling here. Convert and kill.
• Floor 3. Convert and stall for Kiri. He doesn't use his board-changing garbage above 75%, so you can just 1c for 15 or so turns while saving waters and then blast him down to resolve. You can't die to this either, so aim to leave this floor with all actives available.
• Floor 4. Convert and stall. It's pretty much impossible to die here. If you have both Kiris up when you kill, you're done stalling for the rest of this run.
• Floor 5. Convert. Kill. No stall needed. Fantasize about all the Dragon-type spawns like this one that Kiri completely demolishes.
• Floor 6. Convert. I thought Alfecca was a Dragon for two years and discovered this week that it's actually Machine/Physical. You don't have to stall here either because the final floor is already red. Kill Alfecca with the orbs it so generously provides, and feel free to use Kiri's active  to haste your other cards.
• Floor 7. At the end of his skill sequence, he'll repeatedly spam Iron Rampage, which will hit you for around 7400 damage a turn. Misery autoheals for 7000, making this totally trivial to survive, so you can wait out his shield and wear him down. If you're not autohealing, use your Heart making actives to avoid an untimely death!

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Challenge 10 -- 1.5x to Dragons

Overview. Annoying to run traditionally. There is a reasonable diversity of annoying mechanics, not much breathing room, and a fairly intimidating Zeus-Dios with five billion effective HP at the end of it all. The stat bonus to Dragons might seem trivial for a team like this, but is quite relevant in letting you tank Sevenzard's preemptive without needing an active. It also helps in killing Beyzul before he wastes you.

Team Setup. Due to Kiri's triple killers, it should not be too hard to convert and one-shot Beyzul with a 2/3 board combination. You do have four turns before he kills you, so you can enter the dungeon with as little as 12 SB. Some kind of shield is necessary for Dios' 77k preempt. SBR is not required here (Persephone skill binds but not meaningfully). One Kiri needs at least four SDR (five is recommended) to make Kotodama doable.



Again, one of the Kiris must have at least 4 SDR. A protection inherit will not work, as you will still be unable to get Kiri back up after converting Kotodama. Urd and Sitri function here to create a 2/3 water, 1/3 heart board, as before, and you may replace them with appropriate alternatives. Ganesha is nice for the extra damage on Beyzul and Sevenzard but can be replaced by Shaitan, any Indra, Awoken Ganesha, or Awoken Raphael. Plessie-Bean can be any useful blue card with any useful orb-making inherit; the rest of the team already has enough SB.

Note that whatever inherits you choose to kill Floor 1 must be up before Beyzul destroys you. If you replace Whaledors with Tengus, make sure you still have enough HP for Sevenzard preempt (or are using one of the multi-turn shields above). In the case that you don't have a suitable inheritable shield, you may stick Mugtea into Plessie-Bean's slot and inherit more orb-making onto Misery. One Whaledor must be sufficiently plussed to survive Sevenzard's preemptive; this requirement is negated if you use one of the multi-turn shielding options above. The HP Badge can also help; check your HP before you enter!

• Floor 1. Convert with your non-SDR'd Kiri and kill ASAP. Use your board combo, since you can't use it on Kotodama anyways. With a 100% shield, you do have the option to tank a hit, opening up some breathing room. Otherwise, if you fail to kill, Beyzul will destroy you with Absolute End; or, if you use the wrong Kiri, there is a good chance you die on the next floor.
• Floor 2. Convert immediately. Neither padx nor PadGuide is very helpful in describing what this floor does. On the bright side, he isn't threatening to you and you'll get ample chances to find out yourself, so I won't go into unnecessary detail. Stall until your SDR Kiri is up (all your other actives will get repeatedly delayed), then try to save orbs and kill. If you don't match the Jammers he makes, he'll turn them all into Mortal Poison, and then into Hearts. These two abilities are faster and less annoying than the rest of his skill set (plus you end up with Hearts!), so take advantage if possible.
• Floor 3. Convert and stall everything back up. Canopus can't threaten you, ever, which is a godsend after Kotodama's awful delay cycle. Kill at your leisure.
• Floor 4. Convert and stall. Try not to match Mortal Poisons, ever, as she always breaks them into Hearts the next turn. It is totally fine to just not make any combos once in a while if it means you aren't dying to poison damage. She can both bind and skill bind you, which sounds threatening in theory but do not last long enough to be actually dangerous. Using a heartbreaker after she converts her Mortals is a nice way to get damage off.
• Floor 5. You can either ping the Kingtan down, which takes a while, or use a lazer. I am patient and like the reliability of an extra useful active, so I pinged him down. Doesn't matter too much either way; just make sure you have all your actives up and exit this floor able to tank Sevenzard's 35,036 preempt. (If your shield is Indra or Shaitan/Mugtea, use it now.)
• Floor 6. As mentioned, Sevenzard preempts you for 35,036 damage. This guy is pretty bad for color cheese teams in general since his skill set involves repeated color swapping, but fortunately we have a solution: pop Kiri, pop your shield for Dios preempt, pop your board combo, and one shot him. He is only about half as tanky as Beyzul, so damage shouldn't be an issue.
• Floor 7. Dios has a pretty nasty skill set that, for many teams, is too disruptive to survive or meaningfully deal with. Fortunately, we can convert him, take nearly no damage from any of his moves, and easily stall out his damage shield and absorb. (If you are not autohealing, save some locked Hearts to heal with after you tank a couple of hits.) When your actives are back and you're ready to kill, clear all non-green locks, swipe Jupiter Genesis to clear green locks, and use your orb generation of choice to take him down.

Edit -- RH94 points out in the comments:

I would just like to add the obvious (in case there are any other noobs like me out there), if you add a tengu to your team you can stall through the 1st floor of C10 indefinitely (you can just resolve through Absolute End, and heal over the next ~4 turns). Once you ping Beyzul down far enough you can just switch back to Kiri and kill at your leisure.

Thank you for the helpful addition!

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And that's pretty much that. I don't intend for this to be a definitive resource on Kiri teambuilding, but this is one way to approach her as a lead -- and it is a powerful enough one to clear some of NA's most challenging current content.

Please feel free to comment, email, or find me on Discord with any questions.